With the dawn of the information age comes the ability to duplicate, change, alter and distribute just about anything. Law enforcement organizations have called counterfeiting the crime of the 21st century. Product counterfeiting is a serious and growing threat. Measures to defend against counterfeiters are being taken by many corporations, but they have not developed comprehensive, systematic, and cost-effective solutions to preventing counterfeiting.
Due to advancing counterfeiting techniques, traditional anti-counterfeit technologies are becoming obsolete. Additionally, governments and corporations that have invested a great deal of resources in fighting counterfeiting have experienced little success. Furthermore, law enforcement agencies that are burdened with efforts to combat violent crimes have insufficient resources to fight the “victimless” counterfeiting crime.
Counterfeiting also extends to specific products where consumables are indispensable for the continued use of a product. For example, items such as an ink cassettes or cartridges must be replaced several times during the life of a laser or ink jet printer. Counterfeiting of this nature is particular adverse to the interests of original manufacturers of the product because not only does this negatively impact the sales of their original consumables, the use of a counterfeit cartridge, for example, may severely damage the printer over time, effectively impairing it from working properly. Consequently, both the public and the manufacturer face non-trivial consequences due to the widespread availability of counterfeit consumable items because any user may be sold counterfeit consumable items unbeknownst to the consumer.